Saturday, May 22, 2010

Catch up

My goodness, three weeks since the last post!

The Arty Bra night out was a great success and a lot of fun. It was very hard to photograph the "models" as some moved very fast with intricate dance steps, somersaults, leaps, etc. so excuse the blurry photo.

Another night planned for next year and I have ideas for more interactive creations!

Exhibition work is coming along. The Tauranga Spinners and Weavers Exhibition is set up this coming Wednesday and the Opening on Thursday. Article in a local paper says "Renowned NZ weaver Dianne Dudfield is the featured artist .... ". I would have described myself as Fibre Artist as quite a few of my exhibits are knitted and one crochet as well as the weaving and, of course, most are hand dyed. I have learned that the dummies for my display are white so I've been busy making black skirts to dress them as this shows off the weaving better.

I got rather antsy at the focus, focus, focus needed to put together an exhibition so have been side tracked into exploring some echo weave structure.

This one I called Tradewind, its a beige and deep grey warp with black weft scarf. Grey and black are cotton and the beige is ramie which I thought was a crap yarn but on googling I find its made from nettle and much valued in China. Sett at 48 tpi which I think is about as fine as I've ever threaded and surprise, its no different to a looser sett, one just doesn't see the progress as quickly. This wasn't what I was planning to do so rethreaded to this.

More like ripply water. The warp is merino wool 74/2 (about 42 wraps per inch) which all the literature says is a no no for echo weave. I wound skeins and dyed them then, as I unwound the skeins to balls, I ran it through wax and it has woven with no problems at 36 epi. The weft is a singles silk which my daughter got for me from the Kyoto Museum shop a few years ago. On the right of the blue stripe you can see the dark echo and to the left a paler echo. This is a warp dominant weave and the weft is hardly seen being squished between the warp threads.

Must get back to the skirt creating and labelling and CV writing ... and its such a lovely sunny day after a week of bluck that a beach walk is called for.